Monday, April 22, 2013

When a daughter calls her parents ‘naughty’…

If your pre-teen walks into your
bedroom one morning, stands imposingly, looks at you with a slanted head and
queries, “So you guys are getting naughty, aah!”, how would you react?At least I missed more than a few heart beats.
I also squeezed hard at my husband until he shrugged and moved away, adding to
my discomfort.

“Where are you going?” I snapped at him, feeling
rather exposed by his assumed abandonment more than the situation we were
thrown into together.

“You are hurting my armpit!” He whimpered.

Was it the pain I inflicted or his lack of
coherence in stringing thoughts of the previous night, I couldn’t exactly place.

My poor man! His underarm was the closest of
him near me that I could grab for support before my balance threatened to leave
me after our daughter’s broad daylight accusation.

I attempted to speak and thought it was
wise to play coy this time. Dads are better at handling daughters, I’ve learnt
with recent experiences. Especially pre-teen girls are to be precariously dealt
with, I have been advised by my friends, too.

So, I drew closer to his new position, on the
bed, and nudged, “What is she saying?” Before, he could answer, our young lady
replied, “Oh! Oh! What ignorance!” Now her hands were on her hips and one foot
stepped in front of the other. She guarded a sly smile, which unsettled me.

“You can’t be walking into our bedroom like
this,” I blurted throwing my resolve to the wind.

“Whoowaat!” she drawled and I pressed myself
beside the husband as if his touch will transfer in me some courage to handle the
situation.

“You like to sit cozy, cozy like this, yeah. And
do all naughty things?”

The husband picked up his mobile in an
impulse as if an earth-shattering bulletin was waiting for his attention. I
grabbed the phone from his hand, “This can wait.”

“Remember, the phone rang early morning. Let
me check who it is.” He was wriggling out. No way!

“This can wait,” I ordered.

“Let him check. May be it’s from his office.
The server might be down, you never know,” our girl philosophied.

“Yeah, beta. Your mama can never understand
such things.” He sat scrolling the BB screen.

And I followed suit. Sat still, gazing at his
mobile screen, like an athlete concentrating to take off on the field.